PrefaceMotivationIn today's information age, computers are being used in every walk of life. They are being used by people of all age and profession in their work and in their leisure. This new social revolution has changed the basic concept of 'Computing'. Computing in today's information age is no more limited to computer programmers and computer engineers. It has become an activity of a common man. Rather than knowing how to program a computer, most computer users simply need to understand how a computer functions and what all it can do. Even those who need to program a computer can do their job more effectively with a better understanding of how computers function and the capabilities and limitations of computers. As a result, almost all academic institutions have started offering regular courses on foundations of computing at all levels. These courses deal with the fundamental concepts of the organization, functions, and usage of modern computer systems. Hence we realized that a good textbook that can cover these concepts in an orderly manner would certainly be very useful for a very wide category of students and all types of computer users.Motivated by these factors, we decided to do research towards the preparation of a textbook on foundations of computing. Our primary objective was to concisely present a clear explanation of the current state of the art in computing so that after reading and understanding the material in this text reader will be ready to play an active role in the computer age.AudienceThis book is intended for anyone who is interested in knowing about computers. It is designed to meet the needs of beginners as well as advanced learners who wish to deal with computers. More specifically, different types of audience can benefit from this book in the following manner:• As knowledge of computers has become important for people from all disciplines, this book can be used by students of computer science, all disciplines of engineering, business administration, management, general science, commerce and arts as well.• At the undergraduate level, where an introductory course on computers is included as a part of the curriculum, this book can be used as a textbook.The book can also serve as a good course material for participants of short-term courses conducted by various training organizations.• As the book explains the computer jargons in a simple language, it can also be used by various types of computer users as a self-study material for obtaining a basic understanding of the various hardware and software components of computers.The coverage of many advanced topics and current state of the art in computing makes the book very useful and informative for programmers and other computer professionals as well.

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